The following notes on the meeting are kindly supplied by a plotholder from Westrees who was present.
"- The Council agreed they could see how the wording of the survey was a cause for alarm and admitted that maybe it could have been handled/written better.
"- The issue of distribution was perhaps not truly addressed, however the council recorded a response rate equivalent to 54% of plots which was higher than I think many had feared, although I couldn't say whether the demographics of this 54% was representative given that it would likely tend towards email and social media users.
"- Julie Rogers from ABC allayed fears of a significant price hike, and indicated that it would be unusual for the cabinet to press ahead with a rise above the county average. Likely £1-2 increase per perch(?).
"- Re: concessions and water - I don't think any firm answers were given on this, but many interesting ideas were put forward
"- Insight into how other allotment sites are run nationwide and in Medway was provided by Steve Clements from the NSALG and Andy Southern of William Road. Some interesting insights, in my opinion, on how Medway handled new tenants, those who couldn't handle a whole plot, water management and fees.
"- The council proposed and the committee seemed to agree that a steering group should be created in fairly short notice to guide Julie in creating her proposals to go to the ABC cabinet. Although there is no fixed timeframe for this, everyone round the table seemed to want to move pretty fast.
"-I don't think it was discussed when or how this group would be formed and of whom - only that they would try to include someone from the national association and the gentleman with the experience in Medway to provide insight."
The timeframe mentioned by Julie Rogers was to have the considerations of the working group complete in time for them to be put to the membership at large at the Open Meeting scheduled for later in July.
Unfortunately the publicity manager was not able, as requested, to raise the concern about the distribution and contents of the survey which has been the focus of so much disquiet, as no discussion of this was permitted and an attempt to raise the subject suppressed.
The full minutes of the meeting will be posted on the wesbite as soon as they are recieved.
"- The Council agreed they could see how the wording of the survey was a cause for alarm and admitted that maybe it could have been handled/written better.
"- The issue of distribution was perhaps not truly addressed, however the council recorded a response rate equivalent to 54% of plots which was higher than I think many had feared, although I couldn't say whether the demographics of this 54% was representative given that it would likely tend towards email and social media users.
"- Julie Rogers from ABC allayed fears of a significant price hike, and indicated that it would be unusual for the cabinet to press ahead with a rise above the county average. Likely £1-2 increase per perch(?).
"- Re: concessions and water - I don't think any firm answers were given on this, but many interesting ideas were put forward
"- Insight into how other allotment sites are run nationwide and in Medway was provided by Steve Clements from the NSALG and Andy Southern of William Road. Some interesting insights, in my opinion, on how Medway handled new tenants, those who couldn't handle a whole plot, water management and fees.
"- The council proposed and the committee seemed to agree that a steering group should be created in fairly short notice to guide Julie in creating her proposals to go to the ABC cabinet. Although there is no fixed timeframe for this, everyone round the table seemed to want to move pretty fast.
"-I don't think it was discussed when or how this group would be formed and of whom - only that they would try to include someone from the national association and the gentleman with the experience in Medway to provide insight."
The timeframe mentioned by Julie Rogers was to have the considerations of the working group complete in time for them to be put to the membership at large at the Open Meeting scheduled for later in July.
Unfortunately the publicity manager was not able, as requested, to raise the concern about the distribution and contents of the survey which has been the focus of so much disquiet, as no discussion of this was permitted and an attempt to raise the subject suppressed.
The full minutes of the meeting will be posted on the wesbite as soon as they are recieved.
RSS Feed
